


your pain is mine

by harbingereleven



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Brief mentions of Daisuga, KageHina fighting, M/M, Soulmates, a ridiculous soulmate trope i just happened to create, ahaha i'm shit at tags, and iwaoi too, slight mentions of blood i guess?, someone help me, they fight but it's a happy ending, titles too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-25
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:48:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25502377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/harbingereleven/pseuds/harbingereleven
Summary: sixteenth birthdays are arguably the most important day of your life to most people. you’re one step closer to finding your soulmate, after all.or,a fight leads to hinata punching kageyama in the face as hard as he can, but he doesn’t expect the sudden burst of pain crackling along his nose as though someone had socked him full force instead.
Relationships: Hinata Shouyou/Kageyama Tobio
Comments: 10
Kudos: 195





	your pain is mine

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fandom_sister](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fandom_sister/gifts).



> hullo, and welcome to my first ever fic i'm posting on here! i started it a long time ago, but decided to complete and post it for my dear friend @fandom_sister whose birthday is today! thank you for everything dechen, and i hope this sorta makes up for all the times i said i was gonna write but just ended up procrastinating hehe

hinata looks around the crowd of people crammed into his living room and can’t help but feel the pang of disappointment that shoots through his chest.

_he isn’t here._

“hey, hey, shoyou! what’s got you so down in the dumps!” tanaka and nishinoya manage to surge through all the tightly-packed bodies and the latter swings an arm over his shoulders. hinata smiles at them as sincerely as he can, but even he knows it comes out tighter than the ones he usually flashes.

“oh, it’s nothing—”

“it’s kageyama, isn’t it?” tanaka roars, windmilling his arms around furiously. it’s a sheer miracle he manages to not hit anyone. “i told that idiot to show up today! i can’t believe he had the nerve to ignore my instructions, the bastard—”

“senpai, it’s fine, really!” hinata says while trying his best to brighten his expression. he fails miserably. “he’s not really the type to remember a measly birthday, anyway… i doubt it’d make much of a difference to him.”

kenma, who’d been eavesdropping on their conversation all along, chooses to speak up suddenly from his corner, making nishinoya—who hadn’t noticed him at all—flinch. “but it’s _you._ if we managed to make it all the way from tokyo, why wouldn’t he even come to celebrate your birthday?”

an uncomfortable silence falls over the entire room. apparently everyone had been listening in, and now no one had a proper response to kenma’s blunt statement. the suffocating atmosphere lasts for a good moment or two before yaku swoops down out of nowhere, awkwardly laughing as he wrestles the psp out of kenma’s hands and shoves the younger boy down into a bow.

“he doesn’t mean that, haha! maybe kageyama-kun is just busy, haha!”

“busy… yeah,” hinata repeats, nodding. “yep, he’s just definitely busy.”

**. . .**

the sun’s almost completely set when the tokyo teams decide to head back. the _goodbye_ s and the _see you soon_ s and the final _happy birthday_ s take way too long, and by the time almost everyone’s left, leaving only the karasuno team to stay back and help clean up, it’s already been dark out for a while.

“phew, that was exhausting,” sugawara chuckles, collapsing onto a nearby couch. the rest of the boys are in similar states of fatigue, scattered all over the room.

“really, you didn’t have to help me clean up!” hinata protests feebly. “i would’ve managed on my own.”

nishinoya suddenly jumps up from where he was lying spread-eagled in the middle of the floor and excitedly turns towards hinata. “well, now that we’ve gotten that over with, let’s see who your soulmate is!”

his words seem to spark something in everyone else, and they all crowd around hinata, pushing and shoving till daichi has to break out his “dad” voice and wrestle them back into order.

“so, um, how do i do this?”

hinata looks up in confusion at his seniors, who are all sitting around him in a loose semicircle. tanaka laughs pridefully at his question and jabs his thumb at his chest. “leave it to your senpais! suga-san, an explanation, if you will.”

sugawara smiles gently. “well, now that you’ve turned sixteen, you’ll be able to feel whatever physical pain your soulmate feels. for example—” he lifts up a hand and pinches himself hard. right next to him, daichi flinches and turns to glare at the silver-haired setter.

“a warning before you do that would be nice.” nonetheless, the captain begrudgingly extends his arm to show everyone his hand, where a raised welt has already started forming on his knuckle.

“ooh, that’s so cool!” hinata gushes. “it’s in the same spot, too! that’s so cool…!”

“what’s cool is your lack of vocabulary,” tsukishima snarks, although you can clearly make out he’s pretty invested in the conversation.

“now it’s your turn!” tanaka says, turning to hinata. “we can find out if your soulmate is younger or older than you! if you pinch yourself and they pinch back, they’re older, and if they don’t, they’re not sixteen yet!”

“that does make a lot of sense,” the ginger muses. “although i don’t see why anyone would want to be my soulmate. volleyball does leave me injured a lot of the time… i don’t think they’d really like being in pain.”

“unless they’re into that,” nishinoya snickers, but stops when he sees daichi’s warning look. “ahem, anyway! just pinch yourself, bro! c’mon, you’ve got this!”

hinata doesn’t hesitate and immediately grips the back of his hand between two of his fingernails. he wrenches his skin with so much force even tsukishima winces.

“bro, not so hard!” tanaka wails. “whaddaya trying to do; draw blood?! man, i’m feeling bad for your soulmate, getting hit with an attack like that out of nowhere.”

everyone else is waiting with bated breath, for the telltale flinch that shudders throughout your body when you realize you’d felt a jolt of pain in response. it’s quiet for a whole ten seconds or so before nishinoya flops back down on the floor.

“aw, they’re probably younger. and we got all worked up for it, too.”

“the gap between the two of you can’t be so big anyway,” asahi tries to reassure hinata. “soon enough, their sixteenth birthday will come rolling around the corner, and you’ll feel their pinch.”

“and when that happens, all you’ll have to do is pinch back!” yamaguchi finishes brightly, and everyone else cheers in response.

“but, i mean, don’t pinch as hard as you did today. we don’t want a murder on your hands, jesus.”

**. . .**

it’s the middle of the night when hinata wakes up, disoriented and groggy, but he doesn’t even bother to check the time because oh, _god,_ his leg is on _fire._

he stumbles to the bathroom as fast as he can, and when he flicks on the lights he’s half expecting to see his left knee a raw and bloody mess, which makes no sense because how would he have hurt his leg so bad asleep? he isn’t greeted with the sight of blood, thankfully, but the flesh around his knee is swollen and tender, as though he had dropped down from a height and landed on it wrong.

his first thought is that he may have somehow banged it on the frame of his bed in his sleep, but then his mind catches up and he realizes it’s probably his soulmate’s doing. they probably hurt themselves, and now hinata is suffering for it too.

but seriously, [he looks over at the wall clock to check the time] four in the freaking morning? what sort of demon is his soulmate to be up and running at this hour?

he sighs and shakes his head before reaching over to the bathroom cabinet. there’s a can of pain-relief spray in there, and also some athletic bandages, so he quietly works to wrapping up his leg as well as he can, not wanting to wake up his parents or natsu after all the racket he’d just been making a while ago. shutting off the lights and closing the bathroom door behind him, hinata limps back across the hallway to get back to his bedroom.

he slips underneath his now barely-warm covers, but before he can drift off again he finds himself wondering about the identity of his soulmate. it has to be someone he already knows. statistically speaking, soulmates are most usually a person you’ve had several interactions with before. so who does he know, someone with a bad knee…

his brain immediately comes up with seijoh’s oikawa, the grand king, and hinata is promptly horrified at himself for even _conjuring_ the thought. and besides, he was older than hinata anyway, and he was pretty sure he already had a soulmate: their team’s ace, the violent one with the thick arms who always lobbed volleyballs at the back of his head.

 _but why would he willingly injure his soulmate if he’d get hurt too?_ hinata finds himself wondering. he thinks back to what nishinoya had said before: _maybe he’s into that…?_

 _wait, no. that’s enough thinking for today,_ hinata stops himself, and eventually he falls asleep thinking about how grateful he is that his soulmate isn’t oikawa tooru.

**. . .**

by the time hinata makes it to school the next day, his disappointment at kageyama not showing up to his birthday has instead given way to anger and frustration.

 _how dare he,_ the ginger thinks to himself as he stabs at his desk with his pen. the classmate sitting next to him jumps in her seat and gives him a questioning look, but he pays no attention to it. _how dare he? he probably thinks he’s better than me, huh? then i’ll just have to show him—_

“hinata-kun!” his teacher scolds out loud, and too late he realizes that he’s dragged his pen so hard it’s torn an ugly line through his literature worksheet. he has to sheepishly sidle up to the teacher’s desk to get himself a new copy, and the back of his neck burns red with both irritation and embarrassment as the giggling of his classmates rings in his ears.

**. . .**

he’s horrible at practice. he knows because daichi has to interrupt in the middle of spiking drills just to pull him aside and tell him that. it’s not even been a full ten minutes since practice started.

“you’re not syncing up with kageyama at all,” daichi says worriedly. “what’s wrong?”

“i just don’t want to jump for his tosses anymore,” hinata begrudgingly lets out. there’s also the matter of his leg still feeling as though someone has made one of those threats you see commented online a reality and deleted his nico-nico kneecaps, but he figures he’s been hurt worse before and can deal with a little pain.

daichi’s eyes soften and his hand comes up to rest on hinata’s shoulder. “is this because he didn’t show up yesterday?”

hinata hesitates before nodding shortly.

daichi seems to study him for a while, eyes flicking over his face worriedly before coming to a decision. “you can switch over to suga,” he finally says. “i’ll spike with kageyama instead.”

running away doesn’t sit right with him, but hinata thinks that it’s the best option for now if he wants to make it through the day. also, with kageyama staring at him with such an unreadable expression on his face, he can’t help but think he made the right decision as he ducks under the net, going over to sugawara’s side to practice the drills instead.

no one questions the switch, but blue, blue eyes bore into the back of his skull, and hinata shivers.

**. . .**

the rest of practice is gruelling, and everyone else has been affected by shifting dynamics. the tension between hinata and kageyama is palpable, so thick you could literally cut it with a knife. they haven’t spoken a word to each other since practice started. hinata does his drills with sugawara whenever there’s a need for a setter.

coach ukai, who has been silent this whole time, interrupts them when they’re in the middle of diving receive drills. everyone gathers around him quickly, anxious for a way to break the tense atmosphere.

but coach ukai, _wonderful, lovely,_ so-dense-he-cannot-read-the-tension-in-the-room coach ukai announces that they’re going to play a match. and like always, he puts hinata and kageyama on the same team.

“you need to work on your timing,” he muses out loud to the first-year duo. “it’s been a little off lately.”

 _a little off?_ hinata thinks to himself scathingly. the ball kageyama had set to him right before he’d switched over to suga-san had missed his palm by a mile and he had then proceeded to slam into the net, getting all tangled up in the fabric. nonetheless, he doesn’t say anything out loud in protest. the faster they get this small match over with, the faster he can leave kageyama’s presence.

the game starts and the first set goes to the other team fairly quickly. if hinata had to describe his playing using as little words as possible, he would just simply answer with the phrase “not pretty”. his jumps and timing are all over the place, and it hurts to even take a single step. he realizes soon enough that kageyama has stopped setting to him altogether, and he feels ashamed at the brief spike of relief that goes through him when the thought occurs.

the worst part is that no one calls him out on it.

not daichi, or coach, or any of his seniors. even tsukishima remains silent, his usual trademark insults gone. it feels like they’re all afraid of pushing hinata past his breaking point, like a single comment from them will have him cracking apart and spiralling into the void.

asahi [who was on the other team] finally slams a spike down, the ball blowing right past hinata and ending the game. he was too exhausted to even try going for that one. he never thought the day would come when he’d say this, but he’s glad the match is over. his leg is in so much pain now that it’s practically gone numb, and all that’s on his mind now is that he wants to get away. from who or what, he’s not so sure anymore.

coach calls everyone to gather around, and hinata forces his body to obey. but the first step he takes is with his left leg, and all of a sudden his knee can’t take it anymore. it buckles under his weight and then he’s lying flat on his back, staring at the high ceiling of the gym as the panicked faces of his teammates come into view.

“hinata, are you alright?”

“what happened?”

“someone go call kiyoko-san and ask her to bring the first-aid box!”

he just looks up at them.

“you absolute _scrub_.”

the new voice, filled with venom, makes hinata turn his head towards the right. and just as he’d suspected, it’s kageyama who’s sneering down at him, arms crossed over his chest.

“if you were injured, you could have just said so. why keep quiet when you knew you couldn’t even handle it, _scrub_.”

that’s it.

hinata snaps.

leaping to his feet so fast it makes his head spin and knee scream in agony, he pounces at kageyama and grabs the setter by the front of his shirt.

“what the hell’s your deal?” he spits. “sometimes you have off days and today i just wasn’t feeling it. you got a problem with that?”

when kageyama stays quiet and says nothing, the words rush out of his mouth even faster, pouring out like they’re never going to stop.

“you wanna know why i was so distracted, huh? it’s because you, the one who i considered to be my best friend, didn’t even show up to what i thought was one of the most important days of my life. and you’re acting so goddamn high and mighty about it, like you don’t even owe me an explanation—”

hands are trying to pull them apart, yelling desperately at hinata to _please just let go of him,_ but hinata’s fingers are fisted so tightly in the cotton of kageyama’s shirt his knuckles go white. he knows his hands are trembling, but he just can’t get them to stop.

“i just wanna know _why,_ kageyama! why would you do something like that? why’re you pretending like it didn’t even happen? why, kageyama, _why_ —”

“i was scared, alright?!” the dark-haired setter finally bursts out, eyes locking down onto hinata’s own. there’s a wild look in them, as though he’s finally been cornered and with nowhere to run, he finally turns and lashes out desperately.

but hinata is too far gone, and he can’t seem to stop. he vehemently wants himself to just shut up, but the implications of kageyama’s words don’t hit him and his words just keep going and going.

“ _scared?_ this is our first year playing together, kageyama, but i know you better than anyone else! i know you don’t “get scared”, because you’re the great fucking king of the court and you never run away—”

“i _said—_ ” kageyama’s arms, previously hanging limp by his sides, finally come up to grab hinata’s collar too, shaking the shorter boy back and forth with as much force as he can muster, “—don’t call me that!”

hinata scoffs incredulously. out of all the things, he chose to react to _that?_

before he can think his actions through rationally, he’s already pulled one of his arms back and it snaps forward at a terrifying pace, heading straight towards kageyama. it’s too sudden for anyone else to stop, and before kageyama can even blink the punch is right in his face. hinata feels a savage rush of satisfaction as his fist collides with the setter’s nose; maybe now he’ll know what it feels like—

“ow!”

two different cries of pain echo around the gym, and the rest of the team, who are all mid-lunge trying their best to stop the two boys, freeze in place and look at the scene in front of them in confusion:

kageyama has staggered back a few steps, head tilted upwards as both of his hands tightly cup the front of his face. blood still leaks from the gaps in between his fingers as much as he tries to hold it in, and the vibrant crimson liquid slowly trickles down onto his white shirt, bleeding into the pristine fabric and staining it.

across him, a few steps away, hinata appears to be in a similar situation. a single hand is clamped over his nose, more in surprise than anything, and as a trail of blood dribbles down his arm and drips off his elbow, you can see the clear bewilderment bubbling in his eyes.

“did you literally just smash your face into his?” tsukishima is the first to break the silence, turning to hinata. before the boy can answer, asahi clears his throat and shakes his head.

“no, i’m sure he threw a punch instead…”

those who can gather their thoughts enough to formulate a reply [daichi, ennoshita, yachi, kiyoko, and narita] murmur out their agreements. the rest, who are still looking as though they can’t believe their own eyes [sugawara, yamaguchi, tanaka, nishinoya, and kinoshita] just stay still, staring at the bleeding boys.

“no no no,” sugawara mutters as he shakes out of his stupor and ducks around hinata, inspecting the short boy closely. “he definitely punched kageyama. see, his hand’s all messed up.”

it’s true: his knuckles are raw, turning red from the force of the strike. there’s a smear of blood on them and he doesn’t know whether it’s his own or kageyama’s.

“so why are you bleeding from your nose as though you were the one who got hit, huh?!” kageyama gurgles. his nose won’t let him talk properly, the swelling impacting his speech, but he’ll be damned if he doesn’t give the runty tangerine a piece of his mind. “you have the audacity to freaking punch me in the face and you won’t even let me suffer in the spotlight!”

“i really don’t think having a severe nosebleed is what hinata really wanted,” asahi tries to calm him down. “so why don’t we all just—”

“he used it correctly,” yachi interrupts in a daze. “’in the spotlight’. the idioms we’d done last week for the test. he used it correctly.”

“also the word ‘audacity’,” tsukishima offers unhelpfully. “i really didn’t think the king would be bothered to use such words.”

kageyama tries to glare at him, but it’s slightly offset by the fact that the blood pouring from his nose has managed to drip into his mouth and now his teeth are sorta stained red, as though he’s just eaten a cherry popsicle.

kiyoko pushes through the crowd to get to kageyama, deeming him the first priority because, well, he did get punched in front of everyone. how _hinata_ got hurt, however, is an entirely different matter. she kneels on the ground and pulls kageyama down beside her before snapping open the first-aid box. “lean forward and pinch the part above your nostrils, please. this will draw the blood into your nose instead of down the back of your throat.”

kageyama does as she says without protest. hinata comes over and sits next to him, all his previous anger drained. kiyoko nods at him as if to say “you too”. hinata silently tilts his head forward and gets to pinching.

“so…” nishinoya starts. “why did shouyou get hurt too?”

tanaka points an accusatory finger at kageyama. “did you somehow manage to sneak in a hit when no one was looking?”

kageyama looks up at him, aghast, but before he can say anything kiyoko gently pushes his hand away from his face to assess the damage done to it. all in all, it doesn’t seem to look too bad, just sort of purpling around the edges, but there did happen to be a lot of blood.

“we should wipe this off,” she says gently, handing him a roll of soft tissues. “and then you can––”

“bakageyama, stop!” hinata snaps all of a sudden, eyes watering in pain. kageyama, who was in the process of swiping away roughly at the patches of red around his mouth, stops his actions and looks questioningly at hinata.

“when you do that,” hinata says, much softer this time. “it hurts. you’re way too rough.”

silence. absolute, deafening silence for a whole minute before:

“wait––”

“what did he just say––”

“bruH––”

the tissues drop from kageyama’s hands and land on the worn wood floor of the gym. he’s staring at hinata as though the latter’s just grown a second head and now speaks fluent swahili, and hinata squirms under his intense stare.

“it’s just––” he says defensively, staring at the tissues by his leg. he refuses to look up and meet anyone’s gaze. “it’s starting to feel like your pain is mine too.”

“what––”

“can someone please explain––”

“bRUH––”

“w––what,” kageyama starts hoarsely, “...do you mean?”

it’s these four words that shut everyone up, and all eyes are on hinata as they anticipate his answer breathlessly.

“only one way to find out,” hinata in turn lets out in one rush, before quickly leaning in and––

“that hurt, _what the hell!_ ”

––flicking kageyama on his forehead. hard.

“what is with you and these sudden bouts of sadism,” tsukishima quips as kageyama claps his hands to his latest injury and rolls around on the floor in pain. “you’re just on fire today, aren’t ya?”

the ravenette lunges at the ginger with murderous intentions [“boke get here imma beat your ass into the ground!”], but he freezes right in his tracks as a single hand softly cups his face before brushing away his dark bangs. he’s sure the flick hinata gave him has left a mark; he can feel the exact spot throbbing away right in between his eyebrows. hinata shakes his orange curls away from his face too, and all the air is knocked out from kageyama’s lungs as he tries to process what exactly his eyes are seeing.

everyone else gasps too as the realizations finally hit them: smack-dab in the middle of hinata’s forehead, in the exact same spot as kageyama’s, is a bright red mark you get only when someone flicks you with all their might.

“you’re _soulmates_?!”

**. . .**

“soulmates, huh.” hinata says the word slowly, letting it roll around in his mouth. he wants to savour it as much as he can, and he decides he quite likes the taste of it.

they’re walking back home, just the two of them. they passed sakanoshita a minute or so ago, and now they’re on the lonely stretch that curves around the hill. the sun’s almost set behind them, casting long shadows that warp and twist with the shifting light.

“b––boke,” kageyama stutters as he tightly clutches the straps of his bag and looks around fervently, as though someone might just pop up out of nowhere. knowing nishinoya, tanaka, and sugawara, this is an entirely justified fear. “don’t just say it so easily. someone might h––hear.”

“so let them,” hinata says dismissively. “i want the whoooole world to know that––” he pauses to take in a gaspingly deep breath, and throws his head back to yell, “kAGEYAMA TOBIO IS MY SOULMATE!”

“gah!” kageyama jumps forward to slap a hand over hinata’s mouth, but even he can’t do anything about the furious blush creeping over his cheeks. “shut up, boke!”

he can feel hinata smiling cheekily at him under his palm, but then suddenly the smile falls off and his eyes turn a whole lot more serious. feeling as though it’s okay to let him go now, kageyama slowly lifts off his hand and waits for hinata to say something.

“you’d said you were scared.”

ah. _that._

“it’s nothing!” kageyama almost trips on his own two feet in the rush to get away from hinata. “it doesn’t matter now.”

hinata stares at him, unmoving. kageyama gulps at the sheer intensity of his gaze. he knows he won’t be getting out of this alive.

“i—i…” kageyama visibly deflates and then abruptly stands straight back up. if he’s going to go down, he’s going to go down fighting. “i told myself that when you turned sixteen, i wouldn’t celebrate it with you.”

hinata’s face falls, and kageyama literally feels his heart pang in his chest. in that moment, he vows to never be the cause of hinata making that face ever again.

“it’s not because i hate you or anything,” he hastily clarifies. “it’s just…”

hinata waits quietly for him to continue, and kageyama takes a deep breath to both hype himself up and calm himself down.

“i like you!”

he bows ninety degrees at the waist before his mind can catch up to his actions, and when it finally does an embarrassed flush spreads over his features. _why am i bowing? this isn’t a love confession!! well, it technically is, but—agh, why am i thinking like this? shut up, me!_

still, it’s too late to do anything else, and he chooses not to further embarrass himself by staying in that position. at least facing the ground, hinata won’t be able to see his ashamed expression.

“i like you,” he repeats softly. “so i told myself that when you turned sixteen, i wouldn’t celebrate it with you. i was scared because you’d find your soulmate, and maybe you’d want to spend more time with them than with me. maybe you’d stop playing volleyball altogether, and then we wouldn’t stand on the same court anymore. i didn’t want to celebrate the day that could mark the end of us.”

he chews on his bottom lip nervously, waiting for an answer. any answer, but hinata stays quiet and his mounting anxiety just grows even further. _did i just make things weird? i shouldn’t have said anything… ahh i hate myself why did i have to speak—_

a giggle interrupts his train of self-deprecating thoughts, and kageyama’s head snaps up to see a wonderful sight:

hinata’s head thrown back in laughter, lips pulled over his teeth as he smiles the widest kageyama has ever seen him. his orange locks burn even brighter in this light, and his eyes are pools of warm chocolate and dried sunlight as he walks forward and pulls kageyama up to stand straight.

“idiot,” he singsongs, and kageyama’s heart skips a beat. “we’re soulmates now, so you’re stuck with me for ever. and besides, why would you think i would ever stop playing volleyball?”

kageyama stares at him, dumbfounded, but hinata just smiles even wider. lifting up one of the taller boy’s arms, he ducks under it and snuggles up close to him. kageyama’s arm hovers awkwardly mid-air, like he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do with it, but then he hesitantly drapes it over hinata’s shoulders.

“that’s more like it!” hinata declares cheerfully. “oh, it’s getting dark! we should be heading home, soulmate!”

“yeah, we—” kageyama clears his throat and finally allows a small smile to grace his features, even though he feels like yelling his happiness to the heavens. “—we should, _soulmate._ "

**the end!!**

**. . .**

**[hah sike u thought]**

**BONUS**

“i cannot believe the two of you practiced with sprained knees!”

hinata and kageyama keep their heads down low as daichi, takeda-sensei, and coach ukai all take turns scolding them. well, it’s mostly daichi and takeda-sensei. coach ukai is curled up in the corner, the guilt for not noticing his students' injuries eating away at him. the rest of the boys are all practicing inside the gym, and hinata is itching to go join them.

“it’s practically all kageyama’s fault!” he protests. “this—” he slowly extends his leg and points furiously at his knee wrapped in an elastic compression bandage “—is _his_ injury! it just carried over to me—”

he immediately shuts his mouth when daichi turns a single glare to him. kageyama snickers next to him, but his mouth also snaps shut when he becomes the next recipient of the glare.

“you don’t have any right to laugh! hinata’s technically correct.” takeda-sensei removes his glasses and rubs his head as though this is the most exhausting thing he’s ever done. “you of all people should know just how important it is to take care of your body.”

“y—yes, sir.”

“and i made them do _diving drills,_ ” coach ukai mutters from his corner. “with _sprained knees_. what sort of monster am i?”

daichi looks just about ready to march over to him and shake him till he snaps out of it, but being the respectful **™️** boy that he is, he settles for sighing and awkwardly patting his shoulder. “you’re not the only one to blame, coach. no one noticed. they’re a couple of con artists in the making.”

“kageyama actually noticed mine,” hinata muses thoughtfully. “he was the only one who did, but it’s kinda cancelled out by the fact that he called me a scrub. that was mean, you know.”

“i just noticed you were favoring your right leg a whole lot more,” kageyama says simply. “your jumps were shorter too.”

“not all of us are such freaks that we can study each other so closely in the middle of a match,” daichi snaps. “you’re not going to be able to play for at least a couple of weeks. that seems like punishment enough for volleyball heads like you, so be glad there are no additional consequences.”

hinata and kageyama look just about ready to protest, but when takeda-sensei’s glasses twinkle dangerously they decide they want to live.

“how did you even manage to sprain your knee?” daichi asks kageyama. “you’re the last person i would expect to get injured.”

“...”

“it was at like four in the morning,” hinata says. “the pain woke me up.”

“i apologized, didn’t i!” kageyama growls, but his bottom lip trembles.

hinata notices but says nothing.

_he must still be feeling really guilty._

daichi is still looking at kageyama for an answer, and the setter eventually gives in.

“i was going for my usual run and i… tripped over a cat.”

no one says anything for a moment before hinata suddenly springs up.

“whAT? how did you even manage—”

“i’m not repeating myself! it just happened, okay?!”

**the end! [for real this time]**

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading :))  
> i feel like the characters came out a bit ooc tho,, feedback is greatly appreciated!


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